Jul 31, 2012

The Opening Ceremony of London 2012 was the first live broadcast in Super Hi-Vision.

Every Olympics tends to herald a step change in broadcast innovation and London 2012 is no different, with the BBC leading the way.

The BBC has unveiled what it calls "the future of broadcasting" with a demonstration at its Radio Theatre in London of Super Hi-Vision - an innovation it has jointly developed over the past three years with Japanese broadcaster NHK.

The technology is also being demonstrated during the London Olympics at screens in Bradford, Glasgow, Tokyo, Fukushima and Washington.

Super Hi-Vision offers a resolution 16x greater than standard HD and combines these unrivalled pictures with a groundbreaking new standard in surround sound.

The first ever live broadcast in Super Hi-Vision was Friday's opening ceremony. A 20 minute edit of that ceremony is now included in part of the demonstration. However, it was switching to a live feed from the Aquatic Centre that provided the most impressive experience of the technology in action.

Truly immersive

Watching the swimming it was possible to isolate sound to a degree that you could hear individual hands splashing into the water and see every ripple in the wake of the swimmers. The BBC introduced the technology as "the closest thing to actually being there" and that is no exaggeration of how truly immersive the experience is. There is no additional commentary over the top, only the sounds of the arena and the viewer quickly finds themselves drawn in to the depth and detail of the broadcast.

As such it's easy to see Super Hi-Vision becoming a compelling part of the experience of watching major live events at public screenings.

However, don't responsibly recycle your television set just yet because it is a long way off the home.

HD TV was first trialled publicly at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984 but took many more years to find its way into our homes. The same will be true of Super Hi-Vision, not least because the BBC predicts, even with developments in compression technologies, fibre optic broadband may still need to guarantee speeds of up to 70Mbps in order to stream the pictures and sound to our homes.

Content will also be limited for now. Currently there are just three "priceless" cameras in the world capable of capturing Super Hi-Vision images and they are all in London for the Games.

However, if you get the chance to get along and see this for yourself, it is well worth it. To find out more about Super Hi-Vision and how to get along to a screening, visit the BBC website.

Jul 27, 2012

You can spend as much as you like on being an official Olympic sponsor but there is no substitute for a creative idea and Specsavers has stolen the show with this lightning quick response to the Olympic flag mix up. The ad has already appeared in this morning's papers:

All the newspapers today went big on the Olympics but gold medal for best front page goes - by some distance - to this wraparound effort from The Times. Keen-eyed readers will note the paper has gone with a The Times of London masthead - the name by which the paper is still known the world over. The Photograph is by Dominic Lipinski:

Jul 25, 2012

BBC Suffolk surprised its Twitter followers on Wednesday evening when a very poor taste joke about singer Rihanna and the boyfriend who assaulted her appeared on its Twitter feed:

So what went wrong? BBC Suffolk at first offered only this explanation:

Later on the BBC clarified that "something" was in fact a hack:

Update, 26.7.12: Instances of the same phrase appearing elsewhere across Twitter in recent days certainly support the suggestion this was some kind of 'spam bot'. Often such attacks begin when a user is fooled into clicking on a link they shouldn't and submitting their log-in details, effectively allowing the 'spam bot' access to their Twitter account.

Bottle shop Oddbins has added its name to the list of businesses findings creative ways to cash-in on not being able to cash-in on the Olympics.

The company has announced a cheeky 30% discount scheme for Pepsi-drinking, Nike-wearing, KFC-eating, iPhone-using, Mastercard-toting, Vauxhall-driving, British Gas-buying drinkers (which may not be that many people... but let's not worry about that).

The company has deliberately picked the closest competitors of all the major Olympic sponsors to highlight what it is calling LOCOG's iniquitous "cabal".

"Do you want to know a secret? It is a question that expects the answer Yes. But for once we’d rather not, because on Monday evening thousands of people witnessed a technical dress rehearsal of the Olympic opening ceremony, and were asked not to blab the secret... To have done so would have been like telling everyone whodunnit in The Mousetrap...Spoilers are rightly named, for they do spoil... So let the ceremony be a surprise.

So you definitely won't find The Telegraph trying to run any spoilers about the Opening Ceremony. Certainly not in a separate article which includes this boast:

...an exhaustive investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has managed to piece together many of the elements of the three-hour spectacular, providing a fascinating preview of what Mr Boyle has pledged will “make a few jaws drop”...

Jul 23, 2012

"I have found quite a close correlation between the number of tweets at competitive times and the level of under-performance. I have found a direct correlation between the amount of activity an athlete enters into on social media and their ultimate performance when it really matters..."

It shouldn't be underestimated how tricky that research must have been for Coe or even his team to conduct. There are a vast number of athletes on Twitter competing in an incredibly diverse array of sports. Then there is the very problematic issue of the relative newness of Twitter which has only seen one previous Olympic Games. Add to that other non-Twitter related factors such as ageing, performance of competitors, climactic conditions, altitude, ill-health and injury and it is clear Coe has tackled some not insignificant challenges.

Clearly Coe is hoping to discourage athletes from tweeting during London 2012 out of concern for their performance.

There can't be any other reasons he'd want them to stop...

Irish gymnast Kieran Behan became the latest athlete to go onto Twitter today to discuss transport arrangements at the Games.

Jul 19, 2012

One enterprising website called ThatBigEventInLondon.co.uk seems to think it has found a way around the strict commercial guidelines of an unnamed Big Event in London and is offering a range of 'reality check souvenir bags'...

If you buy all three it will set you back £45, which is just £5 more than a London 2012 £5 coin. Go figure.

Jul 16, 2012

The Sunday Times this weekend included a handy guide for readers looking to get their heads around some of the finer points of Olympic disciplines. Under the headline 'How to do the long jump' they had detailed diagrams and instructions, including angles of trajectory and a choice of techniques. But even the least sporting of readers may have noticed a slight issue...

Jul 15, 2012

Concert-goers at Hard Rock Calling in Hyde Park Saturday night got a comprehensive experience of live music British style.

First there was the mud underfoot and the driving rain which arrived around half way through an epic three hour set by Bruce Springsteen. Then there was the stoicism of hardened music fans schooled on many summers of wet weather festivals.

And then there was a Beatle. Sir Paul McCartney, the UK's own most-enduring music legend joined Springsteen for sprawling, high energy renditions of Saw Her Standing There and Twist and Shout.

And then there was the petty bureaucracy. The organisers, no doubt fearing the dangling sword of Westminster Council's licensing department, pulled the plug on Springsteen and McCartney just after 10:40pm, denying them a final song and the opportunity to thank the crowd due to a 10.30pm curfew.

Instead, fans were left with the uncomfortable spectacle of Springsteen and McCartney trying to launch into a final number, unaware nobody could hear them, before the whole thing petered out with a resigned wave and a shrug from a silenced Springsteen.

It wasn't very Hard Rock, but definitely the way we roll. Rules are rules and schedules are there to be adhered to. No matter how many legends you have on stage, the good people of Mayfair and Marylebone need their beauty sleep.

Springsteen's guitarist and Sopranos star Steve van Zandt was unimpressed and took to Twitter in search of answers:

Jul 14, 2012

You would have thought the Olympics were exciting enough - or at least controversial enough - to keep the media in proper news stories but it seems not.

The BBC is reporting that "only" 36 per cent of us answered "yes" when asked whether we are more excited about the Olympics today than we were in January.

At first glance it sounds bad and it was certainly portrayed as bad news for Olympic organisers. But it's possibly worse news for people who like to see statistics used in a sensible and meaningful way.

Consider the case of somebody who was super excited about the Olympics in January but is still just as super excited today. Not more so. Asked that question, they would rightly answer "no".

"I couldn't get more excited," they might respond, while waving an Olympic flag and eating one of the official snackfoods of the London 2012 Olympics. But they still go in the "no" column.

But somebody who "probably couldn't give a toss about the Olympics" in January whose position has since matured to "definitely couldn't give a toss" would also answer "no", as would anybody whose utter lack of excitement about the games has been total and unwavering.

But there may also be lots of people who are very much in favour of the Olympics who simply do not feel any more excited now than they were at an arbitrary point earlier in the year. After all, the games hadn't started then and they haven't started now.

So the "no" camp could consist of impossibly excited Olympics fans, some disenfranchised grumblers and a lot of different people in between.

Chips and missiles

Meanwhile the "Yes" camp will include all sorts, from the fans whose already feverish excitement is growing further as the games get nearer to more reticent souls who are looking forward to the sport finally beginning and the interminable build up, with its talk of chips and missiles, finally ending.

Or to put it another way, the "yes" camp could consist of impossibly excited Olympics fans, some disenfranchised grumblers and a lot of different people in between.

And all of this of course is assuming anybody can remember how excited about the Olympics they were in January, which I certainly can't. I don't think I'm more excited now but I'm definitely in favour of the games and looking forward to them.

The fact this nonsense question and the flawed statistics it produced tell us nothing is neither here nor there of course. The story was clearly intended in a glance to make people think that only a third of us are excited about the Olympics. We're in a negative phase of the Olympic story arc (or the "Olympic news parabola", as Charlie Beckett branded it this week).

However, this hasn't been the dodgiest Olympic stat of the week.

That honour goes to the outlets reporting there is "a 50 per cent chance" that a bomb or deadly weapon will be taken into an Olympic venue. The reports are based on one person's account of the training security staff have received and a finger in the air guesstimation of the risk posed by persons unknown.

Ridiculous

And it's not just the media losing a little perspective over the forthcoming games. Index on Sponsorship pointed out this week that LOCOG is trying to change the way the internet works.

This from LOCOG's online terms and conditions:

Links to the Site. You may create your own link to the Site, provided that your link is in a text-only format... and agree that no such link shall portray us or any other official London 2012 organisations (or our or their activities, products or services) in a false, misleading, derogatory or otherwise objectionable manner.

So you're not allowed to link to the London 2012 website if you're going to be rude about them? Good luck enforcing that.

Meanwhile, BBC mockumentary TwentyTwelve may have long since been left trailing by the beyond-parody real life lunacy of LOCOG, but it's still worth tuning in for the final couple of episodes and the Digital Strategy of PR agency Perfect Curve is well worth a watch... if only for the line about "Twibbons, Twadges and Twandanas"...

Jul 12, 2012

It's easy to imagine it's been a rough 24 hours for the O2 customer service team after hundreds of thousands of users were left without use of their mobile phones by a technical error. But it seems the team managing O2's twitter feed aren't letting the inevitable abuse get to them...

Despite the name, 'film of the day' tweets from Ferdinand appear not to be a regular feature in the footballer's feed. And some have even suggested there might be more to Ferdinand's tweet than a desire to reveal his terrible taste in movies.

It's not the first time a Manchester United player has tweeted about their favourite movies. Last year, possibly to distract from all the negative attention around his team mate Ryan Giggs who was alleged to have had an affair with his sister-in-law, Wayne Rooney shared this tweet expressing a love of Saving Private Ryan and Sister Act 2: